Pooka's Empire Blog

Shout a Ticker!

2010-08-21T15:07:00.000-07:00

I am not too sure I like mention notifications. It seems odd to me the mentions I get. People post status updates of all of these tickers to go check out or buy. Well see, these lists are of people who tend to be leaders and loud, and well, how is there any point to that?

How about we start shouting out some cool people or stocks for companies who have something to offer? People/companies you like, who are interactive and should maybe noticed more. Trust me, I am noticed a lot. And so are all those people I keep getting listed with.

I don't know if listing me is supposed to be flattering, but you know, instead of grouping me in with a bunch of loudmouths, how about grouping me in with some of these stocks?

Let's start with (e)JUNKIE Cream Junkie is one of the first companies to offer rewards at Empire Avenue they deserve a hi. Why not check out their website? They started a new twitter today as well. Maybe you should go follow them there. I have already placed my order, I will get it this week :) All of my dealings with them so far have been fabulous. I can't wait to get my product.
Cream Junkie Twitter
Website

Next let's talk (e)BEAMDG another of the first companies to come on board with rewards. There is an article about them in the Edmonton Journal today. I purchased the reward already, but haven't made a purchase there yet. I am a girl, bath stuff before video games :)
Beamdog Twitter
Website
Facebook

(e)HAREDU Ben Harris has been an online friend of mine for a very, very long time. He is one of the smartest, nicest people I know. He has worked his ass off to make this company, he has a great following. If you need a dose of nerdiness and want to talk science this is the place to go. They make Reinventing Science Kits that are pretty cool and worth checking out.
Reinventing Science Twitter
Facebook

(e)PE Photevoke was one if the first stocks I encountered at Empire Ave. I love this site, I love the idea of it. I retweet them, I share them, I think it something that people should see. I LOVE Photevoke!
Photevoke Twitter
Website
Facebook

(e)VMOB Yes, I have already done a whole blog post on them, so you know the scoop. But you know I have this thing about indie pretty much anything. I am always going to support the little guys when I can, especially when their 'customer service' is amazing. If you interact and care and do things right, I think you more than deserve my loyalty. (e)VMOB has mine. :) I wish them the very best and hope that their web series does extremely well. Joe Wilson ROCKS!
Vampire Mob Twitter
Website
Facebook

(e)ELM I have to admit, I have not been to Elm Cafe yet. They tweet their specials every day and make me hungry. I hear all over twitter they have great food, and one of these days I will get off my butt and get there.
Elm Cafe Twitter

(e)DINO I have been to Jurassic Forest twice already. I LOVE this place. There are pics all over my facebook and my Flickr. I want to go again! We don't get stuff this cool here. Someone spent very good money on this place. The land is pristine, the dinos are cool, it is priced well and I am floored by how awesome this place is. If you are in and around Edmonton, I highly recommend (e)DINO
Jurassic Forest Twitter
Website
Facebook

What stock have you encountered that gets overlooked? Maybe think of THESE people when you post your shoutouts. Make Empire Avenue a little more about what it is supposed to be.

-Fray

Rewards!!

2010-08-18T21:05:00.000-07:00

We just got a blog post talking about the rewards stage opening for Empire Ave! (e)JUNKIE and (e)BEAMDG are offering discounts in trade for eaves! I am picking up some bath stuff from Junkie right now, looks like awesome stuff! So excited. What this can mean for businesses and players is really awesome. I can't wait to see where it leads!

Vampire Mob On Empire Ave

2010-08-15T08:51:00.000-07:00

Somehow while I was talking about the Vampire Mob City Facebook game on Twitter Vampire Mob started following me. I found this funny and went and checked it out. This Vampire Mob is NOT a Facebook game!. I have to admit they are the best random follower I have ever had.

Vampire Mob is a web series about a guy who has become a Vampire and what that does to his family life. You see, his wife decides to bite her mother. The mother in law decides she is moving in. Forever.

It curses as much as I do, it is funny and refreshing, and I am completely addicted. The cast rocks: John Colella (CSI: NY, The West Wing), Reamy Hall (General Hospital, Bowfinger), Marcia Wallace (The Simpsons, The Bob Newhart Show), Kirsten Vangsness (Criminal Minds), Chris Mulkey (Twin Peaks, Boardwalk Empire). It is created, written & directed by Joe Wilson

We are now on episode 2. In order to unlock each episode the previous one needs a certain number of views. If you are a friend on my Facebook, you have seen me post about this over and over again. I NEED Episode 3. I can't get to episode 3 unless you guys go watch episode 2! You should also watch episode one so you know what is going on.

For your convenience they are here: They are only 6 minutes long BTW and curse better than my twitter feed on PMS week :)

Episode One

Episode Two

If you go to the website http://www.vampiremob.com/ and become part of the inner circle, there are perks.

There is a fan page on Facebook and they are @VampireMob on Twitter.

Why is this on an Empire Avenue blog? Well Vampire Mob is now on EAv. e(VMOB)

I have been plugging this stock for a couple days, and this is why:

Their twitter interaction is great!
They actually respond to their followers, ask us questions, retweet and get retweeted.
They have an active Facebook.
They have a blog.
They already have this social media thing under control.
I like them and the series.

It is just a complete win to me. I highly recommend you check out the shows, follow on twitter, pick up some stock and say hi. You really won't regret it.

Sell Pooka

2010-08-06T07:41:00.000-07:00

Here is the thing, I love Empire Avenue. I think their team does a fabulous job at what they do. Yes, I get a little irate and ranty, but it is because I care. I would also like to state, for the record, that my issues with the upgrades and what it was doing to my portfolio were brought to their attention, and not just thrown on a random place on the net. So when I get annoyed I am using my blog :P~~~

The last meetup was around when communities came out. I was whining about searching personal communities.I was told something about since there are secret communities, they couldn't do that. I hadn't heard of secret communities, and my gut reaction was "Why would we have secret communtiites on Empire Avenue? " Secret communities belong somewhere else.

Now that all of this other stuff has come out I will tell you one this. I 100% believe that sentiment.

I have to tell you I was invited to the Cabal when it started. I have no idea why. I took one look at the member list, to be honest, and left. I don't play like the people in there and didn't want to be associated with it. I don't even know who invited me, I don't know if they voted on me, I don't care, but I am going to make this clear, these are not values I believe in.

Not ANY exclusionary, elitist group.

My stand on communities is that they should be a water cooler place that people with the same interests get together and exchange ideas, find people they wouldn't otherwise, with the site growing so big.

What I do not want to see communities do, is create an atmosphere of who is 'in' and who is out. At this fledgling stage that Empire Avenue is in, I do not see how this is beneficial to the site. The focus should really be one of connecting, meeting people, improving your social media skills.

I do not believe it should be a group of people pushing each other up the boards because they are part of some exclusive club, recommending each other to make money, and improve their stock value. The focus of Empire Avenue is content. Maybe people should be focusing on their content and interaction skills.

I think people should keep in mind there are 1000's of people on this site. A lot of people to connect with. Of the people I have connected with and became friends with, I can tell you most would not be allowed in these clubs. I think this is where my issue is. If you want to concentrate on the power players and who is worth the most, you really aren't getting it.

I have no idea why exactly my stock is so high. Yes I tweet a lot. I have a lot of friends on twitter. I blog a little, I have stuff that wants to come out of my head. My Facebook is a crazy gong show. To be honest I love my Facebook sooo much more since I started Empire Avenue. I might drive a couple people crazy with it, but the feedback from my friends about how much fun my wall is blows my mind.

Should any of this put me in the 80 range? I don't think so. I see people who tweet more, have more followers, blog more. I do not understand why I am where I am, but I can tell you this. No one person or group put me there. I put me there, everyone put me there. I came to Empire Avenue, played with what to do on Twitter and Facebook to see how it affected my stock, yes. But this hard core player reputation I have is wrong.

If I recommend a buy, there is a valid reason for it. I am not pushing anyone so I make money. It is really a stock I think you should buy. I am going to read and comment on your blog because I enjoy your content. I am going to follow you on Twitter because you are someone I am interested in knowing more about.

Yeah I might buy and sell your stock. You will get used to it. Gambling on what someone's value is is the game to me. I bet 50 shares at 10 that you are going to rise. I pull out at 25 because that is where I think you will stop. Am I hard core about it? Newp. I was at the beginning when I needed those eaves, but now that I don't, I don't look. The only time I look to see what anyone is doing is when I need to go sell someone to buy another stock.

Quite frankly I am disgusted with the antics of the hard core players, and I would rather fall back to the middle. I would really like to be a 20 stock. I would rather be on Empire Avenue, and connect and enjoy myself. I really don't want anyone to think I am any part of that style of play.

I would really appreciate if you sold my stocks and dropped my value. Hard. If this is really what the Empire Avenue leader board is supposed to be about, I do not want any part of it. I want to enjoy the good things about Empire Avenue instead.

-POOKA

The Upgrade Landslide

2010-08-05T08:18:00.000-07:00

So, I have been a little vocal, irate maybe about this luxury tax stuff. So, I thought I would show you this, just so you can see my side. I know a few people seem to think I am a whiner, but you know what happens when you are running at the top of the leader boards? Things happen to you first. I was mocked for the sell me messages when I would beg people to sell me, and now it is common to see them, common for people to ask for their shares back.
Want to see what happens when you spend the time and effort to make your portfolio make money, for people buying you? This:

That large spike at the end there is the refund I got for the price drop in upgrades. Even accounting for that, I would not make it back up to where I started before the upgrade.
So my stock price goes up, my portfolio gets decimated and never recovers. Is there really any point doing these stock upgrades really?
And now, because I am so good at making money, I am further penalized with a tax?
I guess I could run to the shady side and start group buying and smashing stocks for my own gain.. or I can bitch and be vocal.
If there is logic to this, I haven't figured it out. But I know one thing, if I had to do it all over again. I would absolutely not upgrade. No matter what I try to do here, it seems I just get screwed.

How Empire Avenue Improved my Twitter Experience

2010-07-30T07:13:00.000-07:00

While writing about Empire Ave and twitter yesterday, I ended up on a huge tangent about what EAv has done for my twitter experience. I have decided it should be its own blog post.

My cousin (PGNOME) made me join twitter YEARS ago, it was new and all cool, and well he is way geekier than I am. I just follow along and then kick his ass at facebook games. I looked at twitter, thought "this is STUPID" and didn't sign back in until Facebook took notifications away from Facebook games and they decided to move their notifications here. I had been piddling around with twitter for a week or two, following the odd celebrity and still not really getting it. Then I joined Empire Avenue.

What happened was my twitter follows grew. The people I was chatting with on Empire Avenue, started conversing with me on twitter. They introduced to me to other people and businesses I should be following that gave great content to my twitter stream.

Now I could see the value in twitter. A light bulb went off and I understand twitter now, it is more of a great big pipeline of information you tap into, chat around, it is amazing. But you need that content to make it so.

With Empire Avenue, I didn't feel stalkerish following people anymore. It wasn't scary to follow someone. It was a normal transition to go from saying hi, to following and tapping into the information they were sending.

I could find local people to follow easily, I can see what they tweet and blog about on their Empire Ave profiles. I have a better understanding of who they are before I follow.

Along the way, following those people, you find other people to follow with similar interests. People get retweeted into your stream, and you can go see what they are about.

Now you aren't out there sending random tweets just to tweet. You are retweeting what you find interesting, talking to people, tapping in.

I love my follow list. I am defensive of my stream. I love the information I get from it, and the people I talk to. I think this is why I get so upset when it gets all spammed up when people try to game it for points.

Getting my face out there on Empire Ave made my twitter content a million times better. Now I don't even really care what my favourite celebrities are saying. I am actually caring about what is going on in my real life community. Kinda (hehe)

Edited to add, if you are new to twitter and Empire Ave you should add these to follow first:
@empireave
@bgrier
@EvolveTom
@dups
@aaronkwhite

After Newbie Row

2010-07-29T13:38:00.000-07:00

There have been a few posts out today about how to get jump started on Empire Avenue, getting your profile done and taking advantage of being on the Newbie board. My fave of course being from (DLB) You can catch it here.

So now what? Well, you more than likely haven't been here for the crazy newbie bump that was happening. People would swarm in and buy lots and lots of shares in the new people, get their stock to rise and then sell them. This gave you lots of eaves to play with, but wasn't great for morale.

I will let you in on a secret. I started Empire Avenue about 2 days after the friends and family reset. No one had any money. I wasn't even getting 50 share buys. It was 5 and 10 share buys all over. I couldn't really use Twitter yet. I had pretty much no twitter followers, no blogs, just a Facebook. And I climbed the boards. And I did it with very little eaves.

If you can find the really old posts on (JOSH)'s blog, in the comments you will find exactly what I was doing. He was one of the first people I began talking to on here. He wasn't talking AT me like a couple people were, telling me what to do, he was conversing WITH me, debating with me on his blog while we figured out portfolio strategy and how dividends worked. We didn't even follow each other's advice. He did his thing and his stock picks and I wandered around doing my own thing. We have just hit it off since day one.

I started exploring the site, and the people. I read their blogs, said hi, had conversations with them. I bought a few shares in the new people. I stayed away from the leader board. I couldn't afford them. 10 shares in a new person beat 1 share in a leader. Those new people were stuck too. They bought you back, they said hi and they are still the ones I talk to on my twitter, the ones I have connected with the most.

I didn't have a huge amount of money so I spread myself out to as many circles as I could. We didn't have communities yet. I would suggest joining a couple communities, saying hi and joining conversations. Join too many communities and you don't know what is happening in any of them.

I would also start checking out people's twitter streams when you are buying them. If a person has very few followers, they probably need some. Follow them, say hi and start a conversation. Show them around twitter and both your stocks rise. Simply following people to get followers won't help you much. Try to say hi and learn a bit about them.

I also paid attention to what my stocks were doing, I flipped stocks, watched dividends and made my portfolio work for me. A lot of people still don't get it, but selling is part of empire avenue. Holding stocks in people is a luxury. You have to work on your portfolio a bit to make the eaves for the upgrades.

Holding stocks and buying leaders are best saved for later. Trust me, if you are a good stock, and you are rising and making me money, I am going to buy you whether you buy me back or not. I don't even expect it. I would honestly rather you go buy 8 new people instead, get some buy backs and get your stock up than come and invest with me, go broke and get frustrated. I am making money off your stock, you owe me NOTHING.

However, you are more than welcome to come say thank you, come check out a blog, comment on it, say hi on twitter, whatever, but don't feel you have to buy me. I am doing just fine. Making those kind of connections is honestly going to get you father up in stock price. You will get more twitter followers conversing with you, more profile views and comments, and you will appear more in the headline feed so other people will come look and see if they should be buying you too.

I think a lot of the coverage really undervalues the connections you make on Empire Avenue, and it breaks my heart a little. It is really what I have loved the most about the site. I am interacting with so many people I never would have and learning so many things. The things you can do with it if you have a business are mind boggling. But first you have to understand it and not play it just to play it. Once you get past the game step and step into the connecting world, you have already won the game. And your stock price will reflect it.

Empire Avenue Goes Live

2010-07-28T20:00:00.000-07:00

Today the invites were no longer needed and the doors were opened to everyone.

I made some portfolio shuffles, knocking my "do not sell" people down to 123 shares each now, to move around some cash. I need to start being an little more aggressive with my stocks again to keep competitive on my wealth and to be able to keep buying upgrades. The cut in percentage of share sold value kinda hurts.

I am not sure what I think of the buying 50 shares in people at the beginning yet. I know it keeps the prices from jumping too fast (and dropping too fast and discouraging people) but it isn't giving the newbies much cash to get out there. Although for the record, even though we did not have the cap when I joined, everyone was so fresh off of reset that they were all poor and my buys were 10-20 at a time. When I got a 50 share sale I would get all excited. If I can work my way up, they can too. I guess I just have to adjust my thinking a bit.

I finally started using the sharedeck newbie list thing. http://www.sharedeck.net/newborns I don't get why it shows the feeds on some people and not on others, but it is very helpful trying to find newbies to buy. Would love a list of people I can buy more than 50 stocks in to go with it too :)

(I tried that portfolio thing from them again today, I still don't get it. Maybe I am not as smart as I think I am)

I am also finding that the cap of 50 shares in the newbies and keeping them poor is slowing down my share sales. I have to admit I like this. This should give all the shares I buy in people some time to ripen before I have to sell them for the upgrade. The 300,000 eaves to upgrade every couple of days is kinda killing me, even though I can afford it.

The video they boys put out today is pretty nice. (I need something to call them other than the boys, when I think of it I will let you know) . I don't know if it was part of the master plan or not but some of my facebook friends who don't even play empire ave have been drooling over Tom. Stalker alert!! Maybe that is why they keep moving the video every time I post it on my wall.

Welcome to all the newbies! Feel free to yell if you get stuck. A few have today and I really don't mind. My inbox is always open :) (or tweet me haha)

Oh and one other thing. We all know how rarely I make stock picks. But this one stuck out today and you should probably go pick up some shares :) http://www.empireavenue.com/KEVARM

Latest : Virtual worth : CTV Edmonton: Expanding your social influence online

2010-07-27T21:36:00.000-07:00

Well here it is, in case you missed the buzz on Twitter or Facebook. Pooka on TV :O and a little bit of Tom hehehe

Latest : Virtual worth : CTV Edmonton: Expanding your social influence online

Pretty exited for tomorrow! I can't wait to see what happens when the doors open, and play around a bit more with some of these new feathers!

I really hope this does well for them, they work hard, have such vision, they deserve it

Ticker Tuesday

2010-07-27T08:32:00.000-07:00

My Ticker Tuesday for today: People I have met in real life. These are the people I have been able to talk to, connect with a bit on a real level. Interesting, smart, funny. All of them. This is the part I didn't really expect of Empire Ave. Meeting such nice people in real life, not just yakking to them from behind a keyboard. Takes a lot to get me out of the house sometimes and they make it worthwhile. I couldn't say enough good things about meeting them, so I won't. I am going to warn you about them instead :)

I met Craig (MILLER) and Nadine (NAM) at their garage sale, adopted a lovely unicorn that happens to be possessed. You might want to be careful about accepting gifts from them. It is really really cute, but follows me around the house and scares the crap out of me. Sometimes you just have to be careful what you wish for.

Deborah Mirriam (ECOHIP) I met at the first Empire Ave meetup. If you follow her on twitter, you are going to hear about bikes and decorating and all those other things in life you should be doing, you know the things cool hip people do but you don't. umm i mean yeah! I totally do all that stuff! :P She was across the table and I didn't get to talk to her much until Jerry left. He is such a time hog :P~. The rest of the night of the night we all spent giggling and scheming. She is a bad, bad influence.

Jerry (BACON) and I seem to end up sitting together a lot. We just seem to have a lot in common. I have to say, he is one of the nicest, most genuine people I have ever met. Of course this must be a front right? I have bacon cards on my fridge, he sneaks them into your cig pack when you aren't looking. Like you can smoke bacon.. oh wait.. He feeds you desserts then tries to get you arrested.. he gives you horrible nicknames! He may try to lure you in with his whole good guy thing, but next thing you know people are calling you Gertrude all over.

I was a little shocked When I met Nils(NILS) in real life. He isn't nearly as mean as he is on the internet lol (OK he isn't really mean, he just likes to bust my balls on the internet, in real I think he is chicken. Yeah, I said it! ) He also likes to find you weakness and taunt you with it on twitter. He sends me unicorn stuff over and over to make me cry.

Paul (FAULTY) is pretty hard to describe. To be honest, when he showed up at the meetup, I had no clue where he was. Seems he is pretty low key on twitter and Empire Ave. Then you meet him in real life. He is so insanely animated, he talks and talks and talks, his face is gets all into everything he says! You realize you have just lost an hour of your life laughing your ass off listening to a story from him. He has an evil streak. Since I guess he is an awful photographer and can't take a half decent pic of me, like Kris can, he has to post every awful awful pic of me he takes onto twitter and pretend it is me that is not photogenic. #sigh

Angel Allin..(AZILLA) you know how you meet someone and it just kinda clicks. I dunno what it is, she reminds me of someone I used to know and like, so I think she blindsided me a bit. I thought she would be all nice and sweet like she looks, but she is right in on the evil scheming too, so I dunno, I am trying to stay FAR FAR away so I don't get pulled into the darkside. She tweets about bicycles a lot. and well we know that all the super villians ride pinks ones with a big basket on the front to carry random dogs, cats and squirrels. Beware.

Kris (KRIS) is the person that made me go to the first meetup. I am actually really shy, not that most of you would believe it, and i was all eeeek. He was the one, oh just go.. blah blah blah. I was like OK but you are the person I talk to all the time, so you had better be there, I won't know anyone. So he shows up late, sits waaaaay across the table, I barely get to say hi and then he is gone! :/ I was duped! I got to really talk to him for a while at the last one. I would say he is super easy to talk to, smart and a really really nice guy, but it would ruin my talking mean about everyone thing, so I won't. :P

So that is my ticker Tuesday for today. Dunno what their stocks are worth, but when it comes to people I connect with off the internet, they are worth more than any stock price could measure.

Not really a pick

2010-07-26T14:27:00.000-07:00

Well, he was a pick a few hours ago, and he is on my recommended buys :O, but Dano Tanaka Has come back to Empire Ave after scooting off for a bit. I am glad to have him back. I missed him here,he is a very very nice man. http://www.empireavenue.com/danot He hit 19 pretty fast which boggles my ming. I guess I wasn't the only one who missed him :)

My Home on The Avenue

2010-07-25T10:39:00.000-07:00

I came to a realization, about a month or so ago, that when I speak of Empire Avenue, I speak with passion. Not the irate ranting I do about Facebook, but with enthusiasm and zeal.

I was at a party, and we were talking about social media, and I started talking about Empire Avenue. Halfway through the conversation he looked at me and said, “You talk about this place like I should have heard about it.” He was right, I do. It is really as much a part of my online life now as Facebook and Twitter are, if not more.

It got me thinking, why do I love Empire Avenue so much? I have gone off on these Empire Ave loverants a few times now. It always comes down to the same few points.

Empire Avenue is basically the hub of social media. It connects users’ social media in a way that actually becomes useful. We see their tweets, blogs, websites, Facebook, really anything we would want to know, and they are able to do this while not sacrificing anyone’s privacy.

They don’t ask us who our boyfriend is, how old we are, our address and cell phone etc. People can’t even see our Facebook updates if they are not already a Facebook friend. It lets ME decide what people know about me and what they see.

Because we don’t have to worry about who sees our profile and our information, we can actually go put our face out there and mingle. You don’t get that “Ugh, who is THIS person?” feeling you get when someone random tries to friend you on Facebook.

People say hi by buying shares in you. Buying shares in someone makes them already like you a little bit and you don’t have that whole awkward stalky thing going. It opens up a way to engage that person and say “Hello, how are you?” and go from there.

You can check out what interests those people and see if they are someone you would connect with, if they put out content you would enjoy. Maybe they should be connecting with someone else you have met. The networking possibilities are endless.

As a company, being able to connect with consumers on a real, human level is great for business and for brand awareness. It gives your company a chance to have a personality. It increase blog views, website views, people connecting you to other people you should meet. The alternative is trying to get people to follow you in twitter without being spammy, or getting people to like you on Facebook. Empire Ave, when used in a proper, engaging way puts a lot more power into your hands.

The game element of Empire Avenue accentuates the networking aspect of the game in a fun, and sometimes frustrating way. It keeps players engaged, gives a way to say hello, and bring more people onto the site. On the flip side, it is a stock game, which some people find a little overwhelming, although that usually goes away once they start finding their way around. There is also share price race that seems to turn a lot of people off.

Those people should really be looking more at the possibilities of the Avenue and not so much on what they are ‘worth’.

The user base has grown exponentially since I have joined. I am not sure how many new people are interacting with Tom, Dups, Brad, Aaron et al, but when you do talk to them, what you see while talking to them about Empire Avenue is a passion for what they do. They are so excited by this, enthusiastic about their vision. You really can’t help but buy into their vision. The support they give us whether through feedback, Twitter, Facebook or email is amazing. When there is an issue, they fix it. It may not be right away, there is only so much they can do with the man power they have, but they are on it, and they let you know they are on it. I have yet to have an issue and have a message ignored by them.

I can’t say this about any other developers I have dealt with. I may not need to use the real money options when they are available, but I will. I enjoy my time here and what they have made that I am more than willing to send them a few dollars. Buying upgrades with real cash does not seem to be a game ender to me, I have seen those posts and I am not buying it.

I have been here for about 2 months now, and other than getting annoyed at a few users, it has really been a fabulous experience. Everyone has different goals, but for me, Empire Avenue has far exceeded anything I expected from it. What are your goals being here? Playing a game? Meeting people and businesses? Figuring out how to improve your social media engagement? Once you play around on the Avenue for a while, and it clicks, it really is a great place to be. Even if you have to dodge the odd landmine. J

Empire Avenue and Spam

2010-07-24T11:12:00.000-07:00

Ok, I hate a complete hate on for Formspring. This "ask your question and spam it all over twitter and my headlines on Empire Avenue so I can't see anything of value" is at it's breaking point. I don't know how you use it, but pretty sure it giving you twitter points and BS blog points is fishy. And annoying.
I am unfollowing people who fill twitter with this junk. Empire Ave might let it go, but maybe losing followers will make the stock drops enough to put and end to this crap. I would rather have the stupid "buy me" messages.
They are also coming off the fave content list, since I actually attempt to use that feed.

I am also done with this tweeting 10 @names on twitter with no messages in them. just @'ing each other all day.. go ahead spam for the points, but you will lose followers. The points spammers can just go play with each other.
Have fun!

The Dislike Button

2010-07-24T07:23:00.000-07:00

I was noticing a lot of dislike clicks on non-English ads yesterday. I was like wow people are writing offensive things in Spanish? So I started translating the pages. There is nothing offensive or bad about any of the ads I translated. Unless somehow Google translate was turning all of these ads into something that was not meant, which I doubt. I could see one but not 5.

When you are wandering around on the Avenue, think about what you want people to do to you. Disliking ads might not be a big deal, may not weigh on rank or score or anything else. But it makes the Ave a little less friendly. Do you walk down the street kicking people because you don't like brown pants?

I can't stop you from being a jerk, but in the end does it make YOU look any better to cut people down for nothing?

Not sure exactly why it is making me this annoyed, but it really does. I really think we should be able to see who dislikes the ads. Using it to tell someone that their ad is walking a line towards reporting it is one thing, being a jerkface is another.

Digging into Lists

2010-07-22T10:31:00.000-07:00

Ok so after giving thought to what I would like my lists to do on Empire Avenue, I am finally ready to actually start moving the old follows around. As one of the people whining to being able to favourite people, I feel that my lists needto be a tool that I can actually use to categorize all the information I find on Empire Avenue.
If you read my blog, you have probably figured out that other than when I get aggressive with my portfolio, pretty much everything I do on empire avenue is about people and not so much about influence. I enjoy connecting with new people and chatting; finding out what they are talking about. However, when the Avenue gets an influx of new people, I tend to get a little lost. It is information overload and I can't properly process it.
I want to be able to use lists to minimize this. The biggest reason I followed so many people on the old system was because I was aggressively flipping stocks and building up my eaves. I hated the idea of keeping one stock in people, it messes up my portfolio and makes it unmanageable. It was bad enough trying to track the investments I was making as it was. I wanted people to be allowed to chat on my wall. If I didn't have shares in them, the only way to do that was follow them. Then the Chile explosion came. I was buying stocks all over the place, and the easiest way to tag who I had bought, was to follow them. Then when I would go into communities to find people I could see whether I had bought them or not because the follow would show. This further diluted what I wanted follows to do. My headlines became useless.
With the last update, I cleaned up my portfolio, now that people were giving proper dividends and I could stop flipping people just to make eaves. This made it easier to just follow my portfolio in headlines because I only had a handful of 'flip' stocks left. I could actually follow the content I wanted to.
Then everyone started running out of stocks. Then I began selling off the people capped out, so they could make some money to buy upgrades, and messed up that strategy.
Well now we get the list update and don't have follows anymore and this opens the doors wide, although once you start digging into it, it is a little overwhelming, especially if you have been here for a while and followed a lot of people. They moved all those follows to the watch list, which makes that list unusable for a lot of us until we clean it up. (yes my follow list was unusable too). Trust me I know that too well. However, we now have 5 lists to put people on. 5!!! eeeekkk
Now I have so many options my head is spinning. What exactly do I want my lists to do?
1. I want to be able to easily find when someone whose blog I like posts.
2. I want to be able to follow friends in my headlines, people I like and talk to and see what they are saying and who they are buying.
3. I want to be able to tag stocks that I buy to flip so I can easily find them and watch for when I need to sell, or invest more in them.
4. I want to be able to tag the people I have talked to who sometimes blend in because the sheer volume of people I have talked to is just overwhelming.
After wrapping my head a round this for a day and a bit, I have come up with the following plan, at least for now.
Favourite Content: I want this list to ONLY have people in it whose content I want to check on a regular basis. Basically blog posts. This is the one that will take the most work. This information had been so muddled for so long, I can't remember most of the people I wanted on this list when I endorsed their blogs.
Friends and Family: Ok this seems like a useless list to me, since it would only have e(PGNOME) on it. So it has become a mix of 2 and 4. It is the people I talk to on twitter, the people I have talked to on empire ave, or just generally want to follow.
Private: This is where I can tag the stocks I want to watch to know when to sell. This seems like something I should keep private.
Recommended Buys: This is the one I have the biggest issue with. When to buy people changes all the time. This seems like this will be the most abused list out there. I already have this feeling I should be reciprocating recommends, but really isn't that against the point? If I am going to back a stock, I want to be sure that they are worth buying. Whether they give good dividends or whether I think they will rise. Do I recommend buying them because they are good people (which is really why I recommend stocks for the most part anyway)? You can't tell this from people's lists. They are going to use them for whatever reason they want. It isn't a list I am going to trust.
Watch list: uh yeah This list won't be doing anything for a while haha.
I would really like to be able to see favourite content the way we see recommended buys. I would rather be a fave content than a recommended buy. To be honest, I would also be more likely to buy from a recommended content list than a recommended buy anyway. The way the 'game' has been going by a small but loud group lately anyway I really don't trust the lists. Maybe when the rest of the members get a little louder and go for content over power I will be able to. Until then, as usual, I will be off doing my own thing.
My recommended buy list is going to be short, and it will change a lot. I will play that list as someone I think would rise, or give good dividends. Although that sucks because I pick those stocks very rarely.
My buying strategy has really changed a lot now that my portfolio value is huge. I really tend to buy to give that person eaves. I may not keep the stock all that long, a few days, or whatever because well by the time they catch on that they should come see me, they have plateaued, and I really don't want to tie my money up that long. I can, however give you a big buy when I can afford it if I like you and give you some eaves to play with. The disclaimer here is that I am not looking for beggars here, I am talking about people out there trying to connect, trying to have conversations, trying to USE the social network hub we have going. Not someone begging, spamming, posting garbage all over for fake value. I am over it, I am not feeding it. Should these people i am passing eaves to be a recommended stock? See to me I think they should be. Their stock might now be growing, but yeah I think you should buy them too.. see it is all grrr... lol
Ok maybe it isn't all clear in my head. What do you think recommended buys should be for? Would you be checking out my list? How much faith do you have in my picks?

Today's Updates

2010-07-20T15:36:00.000-07:00

So we can buy more shares to sell now. And buying with cash is coming soon. Undecided yet on what I think of that. I actually have zero issue spending money on Empire Avenue. I am just not sure about the value for my cash for those upgrades. Esp the way I go through shares.
And we finally got lists. I love the list idea. And as much as it seems like I am whining about the one list being full of the people I was following, I am not. I really don't mind. It will just take me a while to clean up the 1000 people on it lol.
What I need to do now is wrap my head around what I want the lists to do for me. I know who I want on my content one. I am not so sure about recommended stock. I am not really a person who recommend stocks, I recommend people. I kind of what to see what people are doing with them before I throw a bunch of people on that list. I would hate people to go buy stocks I recommend because of my spot on the leader board, and then be upset that they aren't the movers and shakers.
I am not even sure if I would use all my lists. Friends and family seems like one I wouldn't use. As well as twitter/facebook so far. So i could use those for something else maybe? not sure.
What are you guys doing with yours?

Ticker Tuesday

2010-07-20T10:45:00.000-07:00

So here are my Ticker Tuesday picks. Once again, I am picking PEOPLE, people I enjoy following, like having in my portfolio, etc. These people could lose all value and give me zero dividends and I would still have them.
(WRITER) Brent's was one of the first blogs I found on here. I love his content. He makes me laugh. Super nice guy. I am glad I found him.

(BEN) Ben found me. Check out (MONKEY) too. Great guy. Down to earth, funny and seems like the kinda guy you could hang out and have a beer with and he would have you entertained the whole time.

(MIMI) I knew Mimi before Empire Ave. She is one of my Egg Breaker friends from way back. Strategy girl. Super smart. Loves birds, loves picking on me. One of my best internet friends. I <3 her.

(PGNOME) I have to choose Darryl since he is my cousin haha. He busts my balls all the time. Great guy. Little off beat and well that is why he is cool. if you can put up with his evil streak :P~~~ Just don't invite him to anything he like NEVER shows up haha

I really have sooo many people to pick. This is crazy. Have I mentioned how mind boggling it is to have connected with so many people I never would have talked to before I started on Empire Avenue? I honestly never expected it.

#tickertuesday

2010-07-13T12:32:00.000-07:00

So, this is supposed to be the Empire Avenue version of Follow Friday. I am going to make a few ticker picks from the people I have connected with on Empire Avenue. The people who are interactive, interesting, and converse because it is who they are and what they do, not for stock value. They talk, pass along and interact with me and I honestly enjoy following them, reading their blogs etc.

We started about the same time, and e(EGOANT) / e(KNAVES) is the first person I clicked with. The reason I actually joined Empire Avenue was to find people like Aaron. The information he passes through twitter is 9/10 times something I am interested in. He has helped me with stupid computer-ish stuff a couple times. He was absolutely hilarious when he ran a contest that spammed the crap out of his twitter followers, and now finally having met him at the last Empire meetup, i got to find out that my internet spidey senses were right for once. He is a pretty nice guy. (and he has flowers in his office it is on his youtube video hehe and the cutest baby!)

Sigh, I kinda have to pick e(JOSH) because he let me brainstorm on his blog to try and figure out how everything worked around here. We have competed with each other friendly style from day one. He is just lucky people like me more than him and I have to keep selling off my portfolio to have shares to sell, or I would totally be kicking his ass.

I also have to pick e(KYLE). Dude is freaking hilarious. NICE person and absolute hilarity all wrapped into one is so win/win. And if you ever get the chance to watch him play Guitar Hero on twitter, so do it! Great show! I should have had to pay to watch it :/

Ok I need to stop or I won't have any for like next week. I really have so many ticker tuesdays it is crazy.
although I am now going to admit my twitter stalking. e(CAPS) is on Empire Avenue. as far as I can tell I stumbled onto him and @justinvl on twitter by some weird accident I dunno lol. Pretty sure neither of them are following me back. I am totally cyber stalking their conversations all the time. And it is freaking hilarious. CAPS doesn't seem to ever show up one EA to even go spend his money. But if you want to watch those two banter and hear about his crazy neighbours, they are a most def follow.

Buying red, selling green

2010-07-13T10:31:00.000-07:00

This is the twitter discussion we were having this morning. A bunch of people are stuck at sold out, which means they have no cash flow coming in to go buy stocks. Yeah, you can be all boohoo to us, but your tune will change when it happens to you.
I will put in here once again how much I detest trading. The person who you are trading gets zero value for it. I have yet to see a stock price move because of it, and the person traded doesn't make a dime off of the transaction. I really have sold people who do it. It annoys me, and in Empire Ave we vote with shares and follows. This is how I vote.
While we were discussing this, the topic of "well, I am not sold out, so sells still hurt me" came up. Sells do not hurt you. They may hurt your feelings, but they do not hurt you. Any stock that is moving, one way or the other is a good stock. Ignoring the weird fluctuations from the market makers adjusting over the last few days, any stock that rises or falls a lot is a good stock. See you have the people on the "ZOMG this stock rose 4 points" kick who rush to buy in, (which still makes no sense to me) the stock ALREADY rose 4 points, you wanted it yesterday. Then you have the "ZOMG this stock dropped half a point" and people start bailing. OH NOEZ I AM GOING BROKE!! Just like in real estate, you do not lose money until you sell, guys. What happens when people go and sell that stock that dipped a little and then people freak out and sell em, and that little drop turns into a big drop? You make a nice, juicy stock for the more 'portfolio' players to go sweep up. As long as that player is showing activity, and wasn't using unnatural activity, those are the sweet stocks to buy.
You want to be selling green and buying red. Buy on sale, sell when you have made money. Of course you are going to have to bail on a few stocks along the way, some people are just not going to grasp it, or will burn themselves out with unnatural activity instead of smart activity. However you will make a lot more money.
My fave stocks to buy are the ones sticking around 11 for a while that are out there asking what to do. Smart people, who are using twitter and using facebook but just haven't quite got the hang of getting the most out of it. I have made a lot of eaves off of those guys :)
However, this weekend market maker thing is killing me. I have dropped my portfolio flipping down to a fraction of what I used to do, I have 'keeper' stock for the most part, but they are sooo in the green it is killing me to not sell them lol

Anyway, that is my thought of the day, if you don't agree, feel free to sell me, e(POOKA), and no, I am not sending you the link. You should know my now to add the ticker to the end of www.empireavenue.com/ to get to a person's profile. Lazy bums :P

comment reply too big for the little box..

2010-07-12T08:51:00.000-07:00

I guess you could, however I find the people who seem to jump on the newbies with all their tips crap are the ones that get on my nerves fast.
When you first join the game it is a little overwhelming, and a bunch of people telling you what to do doesn't help much. It takes a day or two to get a feel for what you are doing. And I think you should be trying the game out with what you do anyway. Then you can simply just tweak what you do normally a little anyway.
If something is obvious, I do inbox them and let them know. And the newbie bump will happen either way. You really need to decide what value you want out of a stock and hold to it when you want to sell it. otherwise you aren't getting ahead. I do get a inboxes from people asking what they are doing wrong and what can help them, and i really prefer that. I am not a power strutter so the way I have it now is what I will do. There are lots of people doing it the other way and it works for them.
I would have sold your stock because you have facebook and twitter set up, but don't tweet much, and haven't connected with me, so you get the initial buy, I will give it a few days to see what the stock does and then if you aren't a person I end up talking to etc i will sell. (sometimes the people i talk to get sold too lol) You can't grow your portfolio value if you hold stocks that are going nowhere. That is something you do for favourite stocks, or stocks that give awesome dividends. And until you get a lot of eaves in the bank, holding those stocks is really a luxury.
Getting sold is not a bad thing. there are a whole bunch of us now that really need to be sold. We need those shares back to sell again so we can make those eaves. When you run out you really do get stuck.
take it in stride and keep going.
Getting around and saying hi and starting conversations is really the best way to get bought and then hopefully you have the eaves to go do the same. Give it a little bit, get used to the buying and selling and it won't really bug you so much anymore, until you have to slash through your portfolio to buy an upgrade. Those don't seem to ever stop hurting!

WHOAH Market Makers!

2010-07-11T10:39:00.000-07:00

LOL my jump was a little um HUGE last night. Pretty cool. The adjustment for the new makers I would assume means that I will be ok through the new ones. Pretty sweet. Beta Rules!
On another note. A few people's Facebooks seem to have disconnected from Empire Avenue again. You shoudl really go post an update on your wall. Give it an hour or so and check that it shows up in your feed. Mine was disconnected for a week again. I so need to start paying attention so I can catch it faster. I didn't adjust any pirvacy settings this time so I have no idea why it did it. My facebook button would still take me to my facebook page but the facebook updates did not come through my feed. You need to click the FB button under the shout out box on your profile to double check yours. If it isn't working, disconnect completely following the instructions on the manage connections for FB page and then re-add it. (you re-add by hitting the disconnect button again lol)

New Market Makers this Weekend!

2010-07-09T12:40:00.000-07:00

Well, I am actually kind of excited for the new market makers to come out and see how it shakes things up. I have been pretty quiet about it, but am pretty annoyed with some of the Avenue lately. I haven't had shares to sell for a while now, and having no money coming in besides what I get in dividends really sucks.
I am having an impossible time finding people I want to invest in. I get spam messages from people asking me to buy them all the time. (I really don't mind the ones that message me to say hi or ask what they need to do do get more activity) I do mind the constant BUY ME messages especially when I ignore them and they KEEP spamming me.
I don't mind people talking on my profile, if I am following you, you are welcome to say hi. Advertising your communities on my profile does not impress me. If i was going to advertise your community I would join it, or post it myself.
Communities are over run and full of BUY ME messages and not a whole lot of real talking, so finding people there is pretty pointless.
I hear that if you buy me, I buy you back (which is usually true). However (and this is an old one I caught on to) buying me, then selling me then buying me again to keep getting my attention. Not cool. How about you stop by and say hi? :/
Spamming twitter with automated or @yourself tweets.. OMG this one set me over the edge. The other night my feed was unfollowable. Yup, I am going to annoy you with a few big brother tweets for the summer, however flooding my stream with useless content every minute and I am done.

I was assuming these were common sense courtesy things, and yeah maybe I am being a bit of a bitch, but I am annoyed. Agree or not, I don't really care. But this is how I am feeling about Empire Ave right now. I hope some of this gets figured out before the 20th and we get a bigger flood of new people coming in, but I am kind of dreading it. I liked that I could find new people to meet and learn new things, and right now, I am really not finding new people to meet, and it saddens me.

Shameless 3

2010-07-04T19:48:00.001-07:00

My twitter stock picking machine is working overtime right now, and based on my super awesome calculations of twerrific awesomeness divided by the integer exponent i have come up with these people that you should buy:

(e)KYLE

VTECH (has no shares but be on the lookout)

(e)GSCO (no feeds hooked up, hear they should be coming.. but you know complex math and stuff..)

e(THAM)

shadz

EAVB_QXYQGUJMEC

New Dividends

2010-07-04T19:47:00.001-07:00

So for the little bit I have been able to check it out ( yeah i am at work and half working :P) The new dividends rule! Instead of having to dig up yucky stocks to make money, we can now actually invest in people we value and talk to again AND make dividends. Craziness!

After spending the morning dumping the stocks I was using for dividends, I finally saw value in buying the share upgrade. I can now buy 400 shares in people, and I am! I cleaned out the small stocks that weren’t moving in value and went and re-bought all the people I had to sell to buy my upgrades. The people I talk to, connect with, that influence me! My portfolio is sooo clean right now! I didn’t have enough money for all of them, but the few I have left I can pick up with my dividends.

I am also saving a couple hours a day not having to weed through all my investments and seeing who is making money, left the site or just not getting it. I have the people who ‘get it’, who interact, and it feels good. It is all the people that broke my heart to sell a few weeks ago for the share upgrades. To be honest, I will literally bawl if I have to sell them again for the next upgrade!

As an added bonus, now that my portfolio is clean I can actually filter my headlines by portfolio, and get relevant information, not just noise! I can actually watch for posts and blogs of the people I want to follow!

As nervous as I was about the dividend change, right now I am in heaven! wooot!!!

If you are looking for a post on how to buy.. not sure this is it, unless you want to do what I am doing and go invest in the people who are of REAL value to you! :O shocking concept lol

Couple things to know

2010-07-04T19:46:00.000-07:00

There are a LOT of new people coming in today! Wooohoo!! I thought I would touch on a couple things you should know to help you buy stocks and navigate the site. Feel free to yell in the comments if I am wrong on anything or if there is anything I should add.

The easiest way to go find someone with their ticker is to add it to the .com/ on the address. I am POOKA so http://www.empireavenue.com/POOKA will take you to me. This is a good reason to have a ticker that is easy to remember. I find I type them in there a lot.

We all have an ID number too. http://www.empireavenue.com/influencer/?u=769 is me. When the newbie row gets really busy and people keep falling off, you can take the person on the bottom, click to their profile and subtract one from their userid to get to the one before it.

Share sales and getting money. A lot of people learn this the hard way (including me). You only get money for max sales once. If the max you can buy in a person is 200, they are only going to get money off of 200 shares. So if you max someone out, sell them and later rebuy them they will not get the money the second time. This is to prevent people from buying each other back and forth to make money.

Another thing like this I ran into was that I sold someone and 2 days later rebought them (under the max) and they did not get money for that either. So when you are buying those lovely newbie stocks, you might want to keep that in mind. I have dropped to buying 50-75 in them so that if I am going to rebuy them later, when they do need the eaves ,they can still get them.

When you send your invites, you will want to make sure you have talked to who you are going to invite and make sure they will accept. The first couple achievements are tight, so you don’t automatically get more unless they accept. Once you have a couple of achievements they give you lots and you don’t have to worry anymore. I have heard that if you ask for more they will give them to you. But I haven’t had to do that yet.

And beware of the newbie bump. You might want to look up that post on here so that you know it is coming and don’t get discouraged by it. Go spend your eaves, meet some new people and invite your friends and welcome to the Empire Avenue addiction!

Ok I tried to write that while I was trying to keep up with twitter and facebook and buying people haha I hope it actually makes sense!

Oh and dont forget to check and endorse the blogs while you are buying stocks. It will make you more money. If you don’t have all your endorsements, tweet it with the #empireave and we will go do it